LAST YEARS ACCOLADES - Gina Edwards

As Big Ben strikes twelve and sees us into a New Year you can hear resolutions being made all over the world; promises to stop bad habits, determination to make a fresh start and faithful dedication to become a new person ring out over the chants of Auld Lang Syne and popping champagne corks. At such a happy time though, it seems bizarre that our mindsets automatically focus on the negative. Instead of praising the achievements of the previous year, now behind us, we seem to put all our energy on the things we did wrong.

When making my New Year's resolutions this year I felt, as always, a deep sense of self hate. Dramatic, you say? Maybe…but my list was long and “relentlessly negative”. I collected all the things I didn’t like about myself, all the things I wished I wasn’t and put them down in words. I then realised that taking such a negative attitude towards myself at the very start of the year, hardly set a very good example for the coming 365 days. So I tore the list up and began a new one.

This year I encourage people everywhere to discard the concept of “New Years resolutions” and create a new, positive 2007 with a list of “Last Years Accolades.”

This list should help you focus on ways to improve the You of 2006- and as you move into a new year; look back at the the person who took that leap of faith, that passed an exam, took up a new hobby or was promoted at work. This is the you that exists in the here and now. When Big Ben strikes twelve, we don’t become new people. The second that divided 2006 and 2007 didn’t see me becoming more organised or less scatty, nor did it somehow magically unearth a new desire to religiously go to the gym. It did, however, see me smiling. If I’m happy, do I need to become someone else in 2007?

Every January, for many years, I have promised to join a gym, which I have dutifully done. However…. every February I seem to be stuck with a binding gym contract and an overwhelming feeling of disappointment at my lack of dedication. I know who I am and I know that I hate the gym, but there is something about January that makes me want to turn my back on the real me and become someone, and something, I am not.

This year I am going to analyse the exercise I managed in 2006 and look to develop or continue it in 2007, rather than setting myself unachievable (and expensive) goals. Walking a mile up the road to get my lunch every day or pushing myself to walk up the escalators, instead of slumping over the handrail and letting it glide me up, may not make me Jane Fonda but it’s still exercise. And more importantly it’s MY exercise.  This small cardiovascular element of my life may seem insignificant to some, but thinking about it and looking to continue it in 2007 makes me feel 100% better than thinking about the gym…and it's deadly membership. Don’t get me wrong, I have the utmost respect and admiration for those women that enjoy and embrace the wonderful world of the gymnasium, but I speak for all women out there who simply don’t…and sadly never will.

Shakespeare once wrote, “We know what we are, but not what we may be.” Instead of trying to tag yourself as something that you are not in the New Year, embrace the excitement of the unknown. Be yourself, be happy and let those wonderful, unplanned events and experiences unfold. What we become in the New Year should be a reflection of our previous year’s successes and the wonderful person that was developing even then.

This year I call for people to accept who they are and learn to love themselves. Embrace you accolades and achievements and look into a fresh year with the prospect of developing rather than changing yourself. Your disoragnised chaos may be endearing - people love for all your outer and inner beauty so does your size matter? If you're happy, let people be happy to love you for it.  Smile at the things that made you smile in 2006 and seek those things for 2007.,,HAPPY NEW YEAR!